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Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Tough As Nails

Painting my nails is not something I do. Maybe that's because of the ineptitude of my left hand to do anything other than shave my right armpit; I don't know. I can ocassionally be threatened into painting my toenails, but my fingernails have not been painted in years. So the nail salon on the day before graduation was very much not my idea.

For a significant amount of time after I learned about these plans to beautify me, I was firmly resolved not to go. Every once in a while I get deluded into thinking I'm actually in charge of my own life. Then I tried bargaining. I said I would go without a fuss if I could get black nail polish. I'm not goth, but mourning the death of my free will would have called for such gloomy glamour. The answer was no. I therefore felt justified in protesting vociferously all the way there.

When we got there, I decided if I couldn't have black, I would pick something blue. And it was going to be the absolute darkest shade of blue I could find. There was a large collection of nail polish on the wall near the entrance, containing approximately fifty thousand shades of red, twenty-five thousand shades of purple, and three and a half shades of blue, and a rather curious assortment of colors I don't even think I've ever seen before. I ran through several and actually briefly considered an electric green color that resembled toxic waste before settling for a very normal-looking navy.

I won't lie; the massage chair was nice. The feeling of luxury ended when my feet were removed from the agreeable little gurgling tub and sanded down violently until they were smooth. It was mildly concerning whenever the lady would disappear and then return with a misterious pink goo and rub it all over my legs and feet, which happened more than once. And as much as I enjoy having my feet tickled while listening to the plotting of my demise in a language I don't understand, I do actually use the bottoms of my feet occasionally and would have preferred to keep them.

I was also apparently not supposed to pick the same color for my fingers and toes, because the lady seemed really confused that she only had one bottle of polish to work with. While my toenails--or what was left of them--were drying, I was given a little dish to put my fingers in, and then it was fingernail time. She clipped them, along with most of the surrounding skin, and then painted them navy. Never have I felt like I have such inadequate extremities. My mother and sister certainly did not require the amount of work I did. And I guess I was in the massage chair for too long, because every ten minutes or so it would cut off. It wasn't hard to press the button to restart it while I was having feet pruned, but with a fresh coat of poison on my hands, it was a good bit more difficult.

When I was finally done, before I could be relocated to the drying station, my feet were slathered with something resembling vaseline and then shoved in my new flip flops. My new flip flops! I mean, I guess I waived rights to my feet but my shoes?! They didn't need to be moisturized!

I wound up having to leave before my nails were completely dry because the appointment had taken much longer than anticipated and I had graduation rehearsal to get to. I guess I was prettier, mostly I just felt like I had a lot less skin than I started with.